Recent tragic school shootings have led to greater needs to protect our children against future occurrences.
Added security at schools has been proposed and adopted by many school districts in the wake of the recent events.
Use of security personnel may be an effective solution, but few districts can afford the numbers of security personnel needed for effective protection. Once funding is exhausted, security ends and the students are immediately back in a vulnerable situation.
In addition to the on-going cost of security personnel, a "guard house" atmosphere is created by numerous security guards. The same can be true of metal detectors at school entrances.
Yet the need remains for effective, tangible protection for students and others in classroom or group institutional settings. It is also desirable that protection against assailants be made personally available to individual students as an alternative or supplement to additional security personnel.
The present invention represents an improvement in individual protection, and has for a first objective provision of a desk top that may be removed to function as a bullet resistant shield that may be selectively used by an individual against an assault.
Another object is to provide a shield that is configured to function normally in an innocuous mode as an ordinary desk work surface but that can be easily and quickly removed from the desk for use as a personal shield against projectiles including but not limited to bullets, knives, shrapnell, or flying debris that might be encountered in naturally occurring events such as earthquakes, fires, and storms.
A further objective is to provide a removable desk top shield that is configured for use to effectively cover and protect the user's vital organs.
Another objective is to provide a removable desk top shield that may be formed of a transparent material that will not block visibility but that will protect the user's face and head.
These and yet further objects and advantages will be understood from the present specification and drawings which disclose the best mode presently known to the Applicant for carrying out his invention.